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Written in fRoots issue 336, 2011


SERGEY KLEVENSKY, SERGEY FILATOV, TAISIA KRASNOPEVTSEVA
Mandarinovie Skazki
MDUK 05 (2009)

Two of this Moscow trio, wind-player Sergey Klevensky and singer Taisia Krasnopevtseva, were in the wonderful Russian folk-rock band led by Sergey Starostin, which was mighty at Kaustinen festival in 2007 but, as Starostin told me then, wouldn’t be doing much more. The third, pianist and keyboardist Sergey Filatov, who founded and leads the Ethnosphere cultural organisation, has also played with Starostin from time to time.
     I happened across multi-instrumentalist Klevensky at Womex 2010, and as I enthused about those Kaustinen gigs he gave me this live trio album. The three (who, it turned out, were all at Womex, representing Ethnosphere but not performing) are also known as Bio Trio, but that’s not mentioned on the CD, whose title, written in Cyrillic like everything else on the package, they translate as ‘Tangerine Tails’.
     It’s an appealing, quirky, richly melodic range of novel approaches to traditional material, recorded live in Moscow’s Dom cultural centre in December 2009. Taisia, who has travelled around Russian villages learning songs and vocal styles, is a fine exponent of the strident, edgy white-voice, or sometimes a softer, more intimate sound. Klevensky’s breathy clarinet, Russian folk flutes and reeds and Filatov’s piano, melodica and retro-ish keyboards expand on the melodies, and there’s the lightest of touches of ethno-jazz in their playful duetting that, rather than taking it into a scribbly blow, always celebrates a melody or creates a new one.
     Relevant websites include www.myspace.com/biotriomusic and www.etnosfera.info, but neither of them has a sales contact. Label MDUK’s website www.mduk.ru gave a ‘file not found’ when I tried it, but failing that it’s possible to track down at least one Russian online seller by searching on the words 'Klevensky' and 'Tangerine Tails'. Or go direct by emailing biotriomusic@gmail.com. It’s worth the effort.


© 2011 Andrew Cronshaw
 

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